A “Love” Dart Allohormone Identified in the Mucous Glands of Hermaphroditic Land Snails
crossmark THE JOURNAL OF BIOLOGICAL CHEMISTRY VOL. 291, NO. 15, pp. 7938–7950, April 8, 2016 © 2016 by The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Inc. Published in the U.S.A. A “Love” Dart Allohormone Identified in the Mucous Glands of Hermaphroditic Land Snails*□S Received for publication, November 22, 2015, and in revised form, January 14, 2016 Published, JBC Papers in Press, January 27, 2016, DOI 10.1074/jbc.M115.704395 Michael J. Stewart‡, Tianfang Wang‡, Joris M. Koene§, Kenneth B. Storey¶, and Scott F. Cummins‡1 From the ‡Genecology Research Centre, Faculty of Science, Health, Education and Engineering, University of the Sunshine Coast, Maroochydore, Queensland 4558, Australia , the §Department of Ecological Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, Vrije Universiteit, 1081HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands, and the ¶Institute of Biochemistry and Department of Biology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario K1S 5B6, Canada Animals have evolved many ways to enhance their own repro- tion, at the level of the sperm, and this process seems to have ductive success. One bizarre sexual ritual is the “love” dart become an especially important evolutionary driving force shooting of helicid snails, which has courted many theories among a group of species with a different reproductive strategy: regarding its precise function. Acting as a hypodermic needle, simultaneous hermaphrodites that do not self-fertilize (4–6). the dart transfers an allohormone that increases paternity suc- Helicid land snail copulation lasts 2–6 h and includes the Downloaded from cess. Its precise physiological mechanism of action within the unique use of calcareous (calcium carbonate) “love” darts that recipient snail is to close off the entrance to the sperm digestion are pierced through the body wall of the mating partner during organ via a contraction of the copulatory canal, thereby delaying courtship (7–10).
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